Race & Creeds

i just wanted to alert you to a couple things i found rather inspirational over the past two days. utilizing my small nanopod, i've been able to listen to a couple interviews of note. the first was with professor Shelby Steele from Stanford U. his discussion about Obama and the issue of race in our country was incredibly helpful to me. growing up in Chicago, being as a white, a minority, was a great experience. yet, his insight into what he calls "bargainers" and "challengers" was very, very keen.

when i walk around the school where my kids go, the students ask me what i'm listening to! they can't believe it is only a podcast. i listen to anything by NPR, a sermon here and there, a number of book review podcasts. 2 gb is not nearly enough. i'm hoping for my birthday this year i can get a 80gb video ipod!

the second podcast i listened to was one with Krista Tippet and Jaroslav Pelikan. he is one of my favorite historians. he spoke about the need for creeds. it was a very interesting discussion and made me think about my own faith tradition, one that claims to be creedless, and yet, in many ways, behaves creededly. he discovered around 2000 creeds around the world from a variety of religions.

so, how does a discussion about racism and a discussion about creeds tie together? not sure, other than to say if we take serious the central tenet of Jesus, the call to love one another "as i have loved you," i must risk pain, rejection, exposure, and change. Pelikan described how his shift from being a Lutheran to an Orthodox Christian was not a change but a recovery, in some ways, of what he found he had always been. which may be why the shift occurred when he was in his late 70's. i find the mystery of human beings as equal as the mystery of galaxies, except that it is much more personal.

shalom,
jg